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Quick HitAshlee RezinMonday May 20th, 2013, 1:12pm

CPS Policies Reinforce Segregation In Chicago, Finds CTU Report

On the 59-year anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark decision to end segregation in public schools, Brown v. Board of Education,
the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) released a report claiming widespread segregation still
exists in Chicago Public Schools (CPS) and the district’s administration is doing nothing to
address it.

In the 2011-2012 school year, 69 percent of African-American students in CPS were in schools with more than 90 percent of
the student body composed of the same ethnicity, according to Friday’s
report, titled “Still Separate, Still Unequal” (PDF).

“The
newest CPS leadership frames the district’s current inequities as an
inevitable result of demographic trends,” the report reads. “Their
fraudulent attempts to absolve corporate reform of any culpability in
our separate and unequal school system are an extension of the
resistance that enforcement of desegregation faced in the decades after
Brown v Board.”

Of CPS' schools with a student body that is 90 percent or more African American, one out of every four has
been subject to school actions over the last decade, according to the CTU's report.

The study
also reveals that fewer than one out of every 20 schools with less than a
75 percent African-American student body were closed, phased-out or
turned around during that time period.

“The way CPS’ policies impact communities, the way
they’re constructed, are racist,” said Pavlyn Jankov, CTU research
facilitator and author of the report. “These schools have
been systematically targeted for decades; African-American students are
bearing the brunt of failed policies.”

In March, CPS CEO Barbara
Byrd-Bennett announced a proposal to close 54 schools,
consolidate 11 and turnarnd another six, potentially impacting more than 30,000
students. But, while 42 percent of the district’s population is African
American, approximately 80 percent of the students affected by the proposed actions are black.

The study was released on the cusp of three days of massive CTU-organized protests against the proposed actions. The Chicago Board of Education is scheduled to vote on the proposed closures, consolidations and turnarounds this Wednesday.

“The
instability created by annual closings, turnarounds and layoffs have
further isolated the segregated schools most likely to be subject to
these harmful policies,” the report reads.

Jankov
suggested segregated schools reproduce segregated neighborhoods, thus
reinforcing a cycle that sustains Chicago’s position as one of the least racially integrated cities in the country.

“We
have a cycle that will never really be resolved unless we implement
proactive policy against it, both at the residential, job and school
level,” he said. “But there are no signs that the CPS administration is
looking toward any potential ways to reduce segregation.”

The report attacks several CPS policies that have “decimated predominantly African-American schools.”

According
to the CTU, “rapid expansion of charter schools” reinforces segregation
in Chicagoland and isolates already segregated schools.

Charter
schools, according to the report, push out low-performing students and
create a culture of choice and competition for youth and their families.

“'Choice' in education has its origins in maintaining social stratification in
the wake of the Brown decision, and choice served to impede the very
demands for equity that motivated the civil rights movement,” the report
reads.

“CPS just has made no indication that they’re
looking at plans and policies for integration,” he said. “Frankly, the
only thing they’re talking about is closing schools, and we know that
actually increases segregation in the school system.”

Jankov
said when neighborhood schools are closed, and “non-neighborhood
schools” are opened, economically disadvantaged students become more
susceptible to isolation and segregation in their classrooms.

Meanwhile, Victoria Chou, dean of education for the College of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago,
said the lack of transparency in CPS’ school closure proposal is
leaving most residents in the dark, especially individuals in
communities that are already detached due to segregation.

“The data
are not so transparent, people don’t really know what to expect, and
folks in communities far removed from downtown are not so well
informed,” she said. “It’s very hard for people on the ground to gauge
what’s happening and develop an intelligent understanding of what’s
going on.”

She said neighborhood schools are often anchors
in communities already hit hard by the economic depression. She
referred to school closures as another step toward dismantling
economically deprived African-American neighborhoods.

“This
is just digging the hole deeper,” she said. “There’s been such
disinvestment and such poverty in these neighborhoods. The education
system is so stressed.”

Chou is a former teacher and principal
investigator for the federally-funded Chicago Teacher Pipeline Program
(CTPP), a four-university effort to develop high-quality teachers for
CPS. She says in her 34 years of studying and working in the education
system in Chicago, this is “the most worrisome time ever.”

Chou says CPS administrators, CTU officials, parents, teachers and
students need to engage in a more open dialogue. She said a process for
education reform should include input from all angles. She also said the school actions disproportionately affect African-American students, adding that CPS needs to find a different process to address
budget cuts and low performing schools.

“Every
action is disproportionately affecting African American students,” Chou
said. “We haven’t figured out how to support all children’s learning,
by any means.”

A representative from CPS did not respond to messages for comment on this story.